Column: Obama starts gun fight, Americans buy more

Jan. 16, 2013
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USA TODAY Editor-in-Chief David Callaway / Kate Patterson, USAT

by David Callaway, USA TODAY

by David Callaway, USA TODAY

MCLEAN, Va. â?? History might show that Wednesday was the peak of the post-Newtown gun furor in America.

As President Obama began to introduce his proposals to boost gun control at a noontime press conference at the White House on Wednesday, gun stocks surged on Wall Street. Shares of both Smith & Wesson and Sturm Ruger leaped, a harbinger of increased sales. As the White House slammed a new NRA ad that lowered itself to bringing Obama's kids into the argument, children were trotted out on to the stage to help the president make his point about the importance of new laws to protect our country's future. And as the families of Newtown concluded the one-month anniversary of the shooting that changed their lives forever and added their little New England town to the lexicon of mass violence in America, both sides of the gun debate dug in for what will now be a classic Congressional stage grab.

That the nation's demands for action in the hours and days after Sandy Hook would soon sink into the Capitol Hill mire was inevitable. The only question was how soon. Obama crafted his speech for maximum rhetoric, but his proposals were prepared to get as many achieved as possible, thanks to executive orders. He's done his part. Congress will now do its part, with the ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines the biggest prize. The debate will go on, though soon the pressing issues of fiscal control and immigration will begin to take up some of the headlines. Even as the Obama press conference was ending, attention in news rooms was turning to the hostage situation in Algeria.

The divide over guns in America is one of the great modern social and political fissures that our country has never been able to close, like the gaps over abortion or the size of government. For every major event such as Newtown, which temporarily brings us together, there are scores of smaller cracks along the political landscape breaking out over debt, class, education and lifestyle, among others. Sometimes we're able to solve the smaller ones or society evolves in one direction. The larger ones remain at the core of our divide, a badge of honor or dishonor, depending how you view it, but ultimately the price we pay for our cherished and hard-fought freedom.

It will be interesting to see when we look back on this year come December, whether the gun debate maintained its momentum. Or whether if faded as so many big news events do in a 24-hour news cycle and mobile/tablet world. Remember the Arab Spring? The media shares in the blame for this phenomenon, though we are simply reflecting a shortening of attention spans everywhere.

My own sense is that the period of shock and mourning has now given way to a period of anger and political battle, and that we should have a pretty good idea within a month how successful Obama and Vice President Biden were in the first real social test of their second term. The delivery of the proposals was calculated so that progress in ways we can all measure, in terms of mental health, school security and improved record keeping and background checks, will be achieved. But the big push for restoration and improvement of an assault weapons ban is by no means certain.

And the ultimate proof will come the next time there is a mass shooting incident at a school. If any of these efforts can help limit it, prevent it, or even delay the inevitable, the drama of the political battle will have been worth it.

David Callaway is Editor-in-Chief of USA TODAY. His opinions are his own and do not reflect the views of the editorial page of USA TODAY.

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